Towards and Effective Implementation of Green Infrastructure in Rural Areas. Challenges and Options for a Substantial Integration with Spatial Planning

The EU Biodiversity Strategy towards 2020 envisages the creation of Green Infrastructure (GI), defined as a strategically planned network of natural and semi-natural areas with other environmental features designed and managed to deliver a wide range of ecosystem services (ES). Planning for GI requires spatially explicit approaches and methods and poses novel challenges to traditional spatial planning. This chapter elaborates on the challenges and options for the effective incorporation of GI’s objectives into planning by considering three may underpinning concepts of GI (1) the planning and management component; (2) the supply of multiple ES as the objective of GI; and (3) spatial connectivity as a key functional characteristic of GI. The main implications for spatial planning ensuing from effective considerations of these three aspects are discussed; issues and bottlenecks in mapping ES and in considering connectivity in planning are illustrated through examples. Results from recent literature is also used to illustrate and discuss different approaches in mapping and designing GI in different contexts, from broad scale analysis at European level to a more detailed example of GI planning at the local scale specific for agricultural areas.